Prince William County High School Student Wins $1,500 of Capital to Grow Business

WASHINGTON, DC--(Marketwire - February 2, 2010) - Nina Maniphak, a senior from Gar-Field
Senior High School in Woodbridge, VA, will be getting much more "exposure"
than usual these days, since she captured top honors during the Network for
Teaching Entrepreneurship, Greater Washington, DC's (NFTE-GW) 30th
semi-annual Regional Final Business Plan Competition.

Nina's business plan for her start-up, Plum Porcupine Photography, edged
out her five other teenage entrepreneurial peers to win first place -- a
$1,500 cash prize of seed capital investment to jump start her business.
Nina, age 18, was the only female out of six DC-area students presenting
and defending business plans before a panel of 12 local business/community
leaders during the January 28th regional competition.

NFTE, a nonprofit organization that teaches entrepreneurship and business
skills to high school students from low-income communities, holds this
competition at the end of each school semester as the culmination of its
80-hour "Mini-MBA" entrepreneurship curriculum. Throughout the year, NFTE
provides school-based and after-school programs to teach youth from
low-income communities how to start and operate their own businesses. At
the end of each semester, all students are required to write a business
plan, and they participate in an "In-class Business Plan Competition."
Those winning students go on to compete first in the Semifinals, then
regional competition, where the top six finalists compete to win $150 to
$1,500 in seed capital investment.

As depicted in the recently-released film, "Ten9Eight - Shoot for the
Moon," winners of NFTE's regional business plan competition are eligible to
compete nationally for up to $10,000 in New York City.

Recently, NFTE received more notoriety as respected New York Times
columnist and best-selling author Thomas L. Friedman singled out NFTE for
its good work and encouraged President Obama to use the NFTE program in
high schools to inspire America's youth in his January 23 Op-Ed.

"Students in schools are looking for real-life skills and to be more
engaged in learning; many youth feel bored in education as they do not see
the relevancy of what they are learning to their lives. In a time of
economic turmoil and unemployment, it is crucial that we prepare kids to
make it in the market economy with an entrepreneurial mindset and key
financial literacy skills," said Julie Silard Kantor, Executive Director of
NFTE-Greater Washington.

NFTE's mission is to teach entrepreneurship education programs to young
people from low-income communities. Since 1987, NFTE has reached over
280,000 youth.